Call for health board to do more about gender pay gap

EQUALITY leaders have called for health chiefs in the Lothians to do more to tackle a gender pay gap.

NHS Lothian’s male employees are paid an average of 13 per cent more than their female colleagues, the Evening News revealed yesterday.

While almost four in every five front-line health staff are women, men are dominating senior management roles.

And as women make up the majority of the lower-paid nursing staff, it means the average pay gap is even more stark.

Kathryn Nawrockyi, acting director of Opportunity Now, the gender equality campaign from Business in the Community, said she wasn’t surprised by the figures and called on NHS Lothian to do more to achieve parity.

She said: “A majority representation of women overall but a minority representation at senior level is a common picture for the health sector. Having conducted this analysis, NHS Lothian leadership can now take action to ensure pay and reward structures are fully transparent and that every employee undergoes unconscious bias training.

“Targeted action should also include re-evaluating current experience requirements and job design for those grades where there is a significant pay gap, such as consultants and locum consultants.”